RoboPets

September 16, 2016

Ever trained a pet? It can be highly rewarding to teach your companion to respond in the preferred manner. I remember when I taught my first puppy to follow the first request: sit. It was an elating experience. Even though he later learned to follow many more requests, teaching him to sit was most memorable.

How about robot pets? While I highly doubt we will replace our soft fluffy cat with a robotic version, it is interesting to program a robot pet to respond to requests in a timely manner. At Robotics with KIBO, we taught our hamster, fish, cat, dog, and gecko to respond to sound using the “wait for clap” programming block in our code. Our hamster danced, fish flashed colourful lights, and our cat sang – all when we clapped or said a word like “go” or “dance.” Now all I need to do is get my cat, Jaffa, to do the same…